The Un-boxing

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Sex Education in Schools

Before Steven Colbert was running for President, Pat Paulsen sought the position. In his campaign, he had strong views on many thing. When Pat was asked why he opposed sex education in schools, he said, "Let the kids today learn it where we did - in the gutter." That was 1968, and I think it still is the prevailing idea of sex education. Good accurate information on sex is still not being presented to the children. The problem is that back then the reason for sex education was to prevent unwanted pregnancies. The common sexual transmitted diseases (STD) were basically curable, and, while it would be good to decrease the incidence of STD's, if they were identified early, antibiotics could be successfully use against them.

However, things have changed since the 1960's. There has been several STD's that are now around that not only can not be cured with antibiotics such as genital Herpes, and certain varieties of Gonorrhea are now resistant to the drugs available. Further, AIDS and Hepatitis C are incurable, and fatal. Sex has picked up a lot of problems.

The problem is that even with these changes, many have not changed their attitude towards sex education. The same objections are being presented against the teaching of the topic in schools. Many religious people feel that their children should only be taught "Abstinence". While it might be valid approach towards sexual activities, it does not prepare a young person for the possibility they will ever find themselves in a situation that is outside of their understanding. They are not ready for everything that life might present them. This is only inviting bad things to happen.

Montana Opposition to Citizens United

In 2010, the United States Supreme Court decided in the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision that corporation could not be denied the right to contribute money in political campaigns. The foundation of the majority opinion, as written by Justice Kennedy, was that 1) corporations are persons and have all the right and privileges of persons; and 2) free speech precludes the restrictions on the amount of money people and corporations can contribute to political causes. This permits corporations to give as much money as they might want to a Political Action Committees (PAC). 

The results of the decision can be seen in the current Republican primaries. All the candidates have in addition to their own campaign committee have a PAC that is supporting them. There are regulations about how there should be a separation between the PAC's and the campaigns, but there are several situations, where the separation is not really that apparent.The managers of the PAC's are often close associates of  the candidates. The separation seems to be only in the word of the people involved. 


The latest chapter to the legal story has recently occurred in Montana. There was a challenge to the states Corrupt Practices Act, which was passed in Montana in 1912. (The act was in response to the corruption in the state at that time largely involving three individuals called the Copper Kings, who controlled the mining around Butte, MT. They spent a lot of money to control the government and courts in the state.) In their opinion on the act, the Montana Supreme Court did not agree with the US Supreme Court that not having the limits does not necessary lead to corruption or the appearance of corruption. The state history was too much for them to ignore.


Just this past week, Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Stephen G. Breyer stayed the Montana decision. So the Corruption Law is now not enforced. The twist to the stay was that the two Federal judges recommended that the Citizen United decision be reconsidered by the US Supreme Court. This might be a possibility that  the whole matter will be reconsidered. 

Things Have Changed

Yesterday I had the opportunity to visit one of the community colleges in Denver (or more specifically one of its suburbs). I was surprised by many things I saw. First, the way the students seemed to be every where in the school was not new. It always has been that when you went into a college or university, the students are the people that make the institution run. They are the faces you see in the library, the business office, etc., because they are cheap, and want the place to do well.

The surprise of sorts was the sign in the middle of the hall by the cafeteria. It was for a meeting of the Rainbow Alliance, the schools LGBT group. Now, the sign was not on  the wall or door; it was a free standing sign sticking out out in the traffic. It could not be ignore.

There are two things I want to point out. The first was how much of a non-event the sign was. It was in peoples way as they walked down the hall, but, if they were not looking for the meeting, they walked around it. It was not an issue more than it was in the way.

The second thing was that the group felt safe putting the sign there. They did not feel there was any threat being so obvious. The meeting was trying to fly below the radar.

I have two responses to these observations. The first is a little bit of envy that things were not so open when I was in college. There was no LGBT group in my college back in the early 1970's, This is a good development.

Also. the group felt totally safe with their level of awareness. Not only did they have a sign in the middle of the hall, their fliers in the student information racks were very obvious compared to the others place there. As a group they felt safe with their level of notoriety.

I guess things are getting better.

US Science Standards Are Bad

Recently the Thomas B. Fordham Institute published a report on the status on science education in this country that is scathing in its judgement of the quality of the science education in this country. Unless you are in California, and few other states in the eastern part of the country, the quality of that education in your state is bad. 

Now one of the obvious issues that has been plaguing science education in this country is the fight that continuously be waged between science and religion, Now the watering down of the biology curriculum by having "Creationism" introduced in the instruction is a part of the problem, it is a very small part of the problem. 

The main issue is that the standards for science education is very low. Our children just are not expected to learn these subjects, and with poor standard the text books and curriculum are not to developed to ensure they are taught. So our children are not being taught the sciences. They are not learning to think scientifically. 

Now there is an intuitive to write new tougher standards called "Next Generation Science Standards" that will try to lift the poor performance of the schools in this area. There are already 26 states that are looking at participating. 

For more information, you can go to http://io9.com/5881494/your-state-sucks-at-science

The Keystone Pipeline

Recently the Obama administration rejected the Keystone Pipeline. This is not a totally bad event. First, the Republicans tried to force the administration's hand by putting an artificially rushed on the dead line for the issue. It was moving forward, but the opposition party is forcing the administration to make a hurried decision that would not be to the liking of some of its supports; environmentalists and labor are on opposite sides on the pipeline.

The problem with the situation is that the pipeline might cross the Ogallala aquifer in Kansas and Nebraska. The aquifer is a gigantic underground lake, which that part of the country depends upon for water. A lot of agriculture is depended upon this water; our food supply is depended upon it.

Now the recent history of  the oil companies abuse of  the environment is quite stark. BP did a job on the Gulf, which still needs a lot of work. The coast may never be restored to its previous state. BP is certainly getting tired of spending money to fix what they have done. There have been other oil spills that are still causing problems.

A small event occurred at a refinery in Denver, which polluted the water under their plant recently. It was not a big spill, and the aquifer is small, and the refiner needs the water for their own use. However, it is felt that is going to take several years to fix; an aquifer is a matter that takes time to fix.

The Ogallala aquifer being huge and deep would be very hard to fix. So taking a little time to look at the situation is needed. The oil companies are not good at planning; they do do not hold priorities of others as high as they hold their own priorities,so they need to let some outside experts look at their plans. There too much to loose, if something goes wrong...and it will.

The Oil Industry

NPR recently had a story on the amount of oil that is being imported into this country. (Here is the story.) It is interesting that the relative amount of oil the US imports has gone down from about 60% back during George W. Bush's administration to about 49% now, and the predictions for the future is that the amount of oil this country imports is going to continue decreasing for the foreseeable future. Now I am not totally certain what caused the transition. A part of it could be the high prices for gasoline that the country has been experiencing. The high prices have encouraged new exploration and production methods for oil that might not have been as profitable when prices are lower. The higher prices would also influence demand in that people would be buying less gasoline.

There is another story that I want to look at on this subject. It seems that about 60% of the federal lands that are being lease are neither producing oil nor under developed for oil production. They are just sitting there unused. (Here is the store.)

The problem I have with these revelations is that you would expect from all the noise the oil industry has been making about need for more areas opened; they want such areas as the Artic Wildlife Refuge and areas adjacent to National Parks opened to drilling. I don't feel that the oil companies can be trusted, when they present their needs. They always are seeking to control more than what they need.

Osama bin Laden Is Dead

Osama bin Laden is dead. A man who did a lot of evil is gone, but the forces that produced the man and his movement are still in the world. These really need to looked again at this time.

Osama bin Laden grew up in Saudi Arabia. While he was from a privileged family he also was influenced by Wahhabi tradition, which is a Sunni movement that wants to impose Sharia Law. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, Osama supported the Mujahideen by providing money to provide materials and transportation for fighters to Afghanistan. At the same time the CIA's Operation Cyclone was providing funds to the Mujahideen.

When the Soviets left Afghanistan, the parts of the Mujahideen morphed into the Taliban, and Osama returned to Saudi Arabia, and al-Qaeda started to develop. Its early focus was other Islamic countries that did not observe Sharia. Libya was one of these countries,and Moammar Kadafi drove them underground.

When the US troops were invited into Saudi Arabia when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, Osama developed a strong anti-US attitude, and turned attention to the west.

The issue here that the US in its attempt to support its interests. The US will support a group which is seeking an end they would like to reach. The philosophy behind the group is not a strong consideration, and only when it starts to cause problems does it become an issue. This needs to be changed.

Koran Burning cont.

More information about the Koran burning store has come out. When Rev. Jones burned the Koran, he put it on his web site. That is how the publicity got out. First, the rest on the news media gave the Reverend the attention no attention. He is not worthy of the attention he has received in the past. He needs to be ignored.

Second, it is now apparent that Rev. Jones is grossly responsible for the situation. He not only did the burning, but he publicised it. The blood of the UN workers are primarily on his hands, and he should be held responsible for their deaths.

Koran Burning

The subject of Koran burning has returned to the news this week. However, the serious part of the story was the murder of at least 7 UN workers in Kandahar, Afghanistan with more people killed in the rioting that follow. There are three individuals or group of individuals that are looking very poorly in this development.

First, there is the Reverend Terry Jones. This story would not exist without his desire to make a statement by burning the Koran. I would agree that as a citizen of the US, he has every right to do so. However, as a member of the clergy he really needs to understand that, if he wants others to respect his religious beliefs, he must respect theirs. I am certain that he would object to people who chose to voice their objection to Christianity by burning the Bible. He needs to show a little respect for his fellow people of faith.

The second person that does poorly in this story is Hamid Karzai, the President of Afghanistan. He seems to be the one who broke the story at least to the people of his country. It was an addition to one of his speeches that Karzai mentioned the story of the Koran burning. Up to that point, the fact that Rev. Jones had gone ahead with the Koran burning was getting the attention that it deserved: that is very little. But Karzai announced it loud and clear to his people. The motivation of the remark is not that obvious unless it was to take some pressure of of himself that he was getting for his own poor performance. What ever it was he should have been aware of what the response of some of his people would have been.

Finally, there is very little that can be said about the people that killed the UN workers. The workers were there to try to help the people of Afghanistan. They did not burn the Koran. They were innocent. Their murders were a cowardly act that has no justification any where.

This whole story is just full of people doing stupid things. My heart goes out to the UN workers and their families, and that is about it.

Taxes

The favorite remark by certain political types lately is that taxes are way too high, and they need to be reduced. However, it has recently come out that GE did not pay any corporate taxes in 2010 even with $5.1 BILLION in profits from its US operations (the profit for the entire corporation was $14.2 billion for 2010). I guess I am confused. I guess taxes are only real people...however, corporations are people according to the US Supreme Court...why don't they pay the taxes that people. Yes, there should be tax reforms, but it should be to close some of the huge loop holes that let some huge companies not pay for the services they need.

Corporate Taxes

Yesterday, I had a discussion with my sister about corporate taxes. She felt that corporations were grossly over taxed. They provide jobs, so we need to give break on their taxes.

My point was that frequently corporations when they are looking into a location ask two things: 1) they be given certain incentives on taxes in the location; 2) the local government provide them with certain infrastructure improvements. However, if the corporations have the tax breaks, who pays for those special things they need. The answer is simple: People. So the very people that the corporate entity is employing are paying the taxes for these things. Does corporation pay their employees more to makeup the added expense they are incurring? Probably not. So the governing authority must either raise their taxes on people or cut something. In the present time they need to cut something, so something else is going to be cut: schools, streets, parks, etc.

Now this brings up another issue in this arena: Corporation want to have the same rights as people in political contributions. They want to get the people they support elected to office, but they do not pay the taxes that come with the free speech.

I guess my point is that, if corporation need something from society, they should be will to help pay for these things; they are legitimate expenses they should be paying. When people are subsidizing corporations, they are only artificially padding the corporations profits. It sounds like corporate welfare to me.

Colorado Election Results

It is now about time to present the results of the Colorado elections. John Hickenlooper was elected Colorado Governor. Dan Maes had 11.1% of the vote, so the Republicans were spared the indignation of being a minor party. Tom Tancredo had 37% of the vote.

Michael Bennett won the US Senate race. Ken Buck felt he had won the race up until election night, but there was a change Halloween weekend that the polls were not able to pick up.

Finally, I had not learned who had won the Colorado US House district until this morning. Dianne DeGette (D) won. Of course this district is so Democratic that since I have been in Colorado, there have been only two people t o hold this seat: Degette and Pat Schroder.

That is the way it is.

The Colorado's Governors Race

The Colorado Governor race has produced some interesting possibilities. Not the least is that the Republican party may be demoted to the status of a minor party. If Dan Maes, the Republican candidate and Tea party favorite does not get more than 10% of the votes, the Republicans will be demoted to the status of minor party. At the moment some polls have him below the 10% mark. Also the rhetoric between him and Tom Tancredo. As they are both fighting for the same far right base, they can do little more than take it from each other. John Hickenlooper can now have the high ground.

Colorado Election Results

OK, the election has been over for weeks, and I have not posted the results. In the Republican Governor's race, the Tea Party favorite, Dan Maes defeated Scott McInnes. McInnes spent a lot money, but could not over come the controversy in his campaign. However, Maes also has problems with a campaign fine against him, and Tom Tancredo is running as an independent for Govenor.

John Hickenlooper, the Denver Mayor has the Democratic nomination, and is just collecting backing at the moment.

On the Republican side of the U.S. Senate race, Ken Buck, the Tea Party favorite, won over Jane Norton. Mike Bennett defeated Andrew Romanoff, for the Democratic nomination. However, the two side in the Democratic race was so divisive, it will take a strong personality to put things back together again.

Take is the results.

Colorado Senate Race

I have written in the past about the Colorado Governor's Race. There is a second state wide race this year in Colorado: the U.S. Senate race. Both of the major parties have primary races.

Now this is the seat that was held by Ken Salazar, before he was appointed Secretary of the Interior. Michael Bennett, Denver School Board President, was appointed to complete the term.

The Republicans have Jane Norton, the former Lieutenant Governor, and Ken Buck, the Weld County District Attorney. Norton is the mainstream candidate, and Buck is to the right. It is close.

The fun in the race is on Democratic side---well not really. Michael Bennett is trying to be elected to the position. He has received the endorsement of much of the Party leadership, including President Obama. However, he being opposed by Andrew Romanoff, the Speaker of the Colorado House, and he has received the endorsement of former President Clinton.

Romanoff is to the left of Bennett, and is presenting an anti-Washington claim. Supporters from each side have disrupted the opponents events. Also the media ads have become very negative.

The various polls for the various combination indicate that that no one seems to have an advantage.

Colorado Republicans part 2

It is official. Tom Tancredo is running the office of Colorado Governor on the American Constitution party ticket. The person that had been running on that ticket has stepped aside for Tancredo's candidacy.

The Republicans are still do not want to support either of the candidates running in their primary. They are on the record that they will ask the winner to step aside for another candidate.

With this news I am torn between two emotions. The first is the hope that this will make it easier for the election of the Democratic candidate, John Hickenlooper. With Tancredo on the American conservative party, and the Republicans running either a tainted candidate or a third choice, the chances of the Democrats seem have an easy task trying to show they have the better candidate.

However, I also have some fear that there is some kind of trap in all this. Whether it is a fear that the Democrats are going to get compliance in their campaign or the Republicans take advantage of the situation and are able to somehow turn the situation.

Colorado Republicans

The Colorado Republicans have problem on their hands; the two people who are running for that party's nomination for governor both have some serious credibility problems. First, there is the Tea Party candidate, Dan Maes. Here is a person who describes himself as a successful business man. However, when his taxes were released recently, it was found that for two the years his family income fell below the poverty line. Also one of his former employers would not re-hire him.

Maes also has some campaign problems. He is not able to attract the money he needs for his campaign. However, in addition to not having the money needs, he has been fined $17,000 for campaign violations.

On the other hand, Scott McInnis, the other Republican in the race, has been able to raise more money, but has found himself in an ethical debate. It seems that McInnis produce some articles for the Hansen Family Foundation on water. The problem is that parts of them were plagiarized from articles by written by state Supreme Court Justice Gregory Hobbs.

McInnis was paid $300, 000 for the articles. He had a researcher do the work for him. He paid the researcher a couple of hundred dollars for each article. The researcher says that he was not aware of the fact that McInnis was being paid for the articles.

This has left the state's Republican leadership trying to figure out their step. It looks like Scott McInnes will win the primary, but he will be asked to step aside by the party leadership.

Into this mess former Rep. Tom Tancredo has stepped. If the winner of the Republican primary does not step aside, he will run as the American Constitution candidate. He would run to take votes away from the Republican candidate. Tancredo's motivation for this threat is not obvious; it is not totally for the good of the Republican party. Also, if Tancredo wants to run as the Republican candidate, he would be as damaged as the other two candidates he is trying to prevent. Tancredo does not have any standing in the old Hispanic parts of the state; while these parts are quit conservative, Tancredo would be very offensive to them on immigration issues.

All this has left Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, the Democratic candidate with little attention by the media. However, at this point and considering the attention the others are getting,maybe that is not a bad thing.

Bobby Jindal Is Confusing Me

Bobby Jindal is the governor of Louisiana. At the moment he is criticising President Obama, because the President is not demanding that British Petrolatum pay for the construction of barriers along the coast of Louisiana to block the oil from BP's blown well.

Now I must define the characters of this blog. He is a Louisiana Republican. Now the major efforts of Louisiana Republicans is to strongly oppose all unnecessary restrictions on Louisiana industries, and by unnecessary restriction they mean any restrictions; they are very vocal in their opposition to all efforts to anticipate problems and try to avoid them.

Now Jindal wants to build a barrier along the coast of Louisiana to stop the oil and have BP pay for it. This idea has a couple of problems. The first is that feasibility of the project. If it was started the day of the blow-out with as many works as can be conscripted, it has little chance of being significantly complete before the oil is on shore. The design alone would be a huge task.

The second issue is there restrictions on to the financial liability of BP. After the Alaskan oil spill there were a lot of people who though that Exxon was unfairly expected to pick so much of the costs. Out of this there were tort restrictions placed on the liability these corporation face when they are involved in these type of situations. This little project of Jindal's would be cost a lot of money. He needs to live in the limits that he peers have imposed on the situation.

Finally, I think Jindal is trying to blame the President of the mistakes that his party has made. He rejected the possibility that there would be problems with the oil drilling. Now he needs to deal with them.

F*@% Arizona

With the passing of my Uncle, I was reminded of the setting of part of my childhood. My Uncle's small farm had three home along the US highway that ran along the south side of his land. The one on the east was a fairly large house, which my uncle had for his family. Going west there was a pasture, and then my Grandparent's home. It was smaller, but it was cozy. Going west again there was another pasture, and then an old rail car. This was the home of Shorty and his wife, Maria. I never knew their full name. I did know that they were illegals or "wet backs".

I never really met them. They were always just across the pasture. I know very little of their story. They came north to be field help, and stayed. When they were too old to do much work they moved into the rail car. I know my Uncle and Grandmother sent them food plates from many of our family events. Also I am certain that my Grandmother gave them food from her garden. She also canned a lot of food, so that must have been sent/taken over when other things were not available. She felt that she needed to do what she could to help these people.

When I was in high school, a new highway was built through the area. Actually it was built through all three homes. My Uncle's family and my Grandparents had to move. I never heard what happened to Shorty and Maria; they may have already passed on.

I guess were I am going with this is that we need people to do field work, etc. We need to take care of these people. We can't just let them in to do the hard work, and then kick them out when they are no longer needed.

BTW, if Arizona wants this law, then EVERYONE that is stopped by the authorities needs to prove their status: citizen or resident. There should be no exceptions. Also Arizona plate #1 should be pulled over at least once a day.